Chapter 1090
Yangyang Village
The group trekked through the vast and desolate Xianchi region.
The ground was soft, fine sand mixed with countless fragments of bone that had accumulated over many years, making a teeth-grinding "sand-sand" sound when stepped on.
The sky grew darker, and the clouds hung low, seemingly within reach.
The air was filled with an increasingly thick, deathly aura, a mixture of decay and dust.
The short guide, with dark skin and a wrinkled face, was named "Old Zhou".
The sun was about to completely sink below the horizon.
He stopped, took out a dirty cloth bag from his pocket, and carefully opened it.
Inside were several dark, rough-skinned things that looked like sweet potatoes but were a darker color.
"Everyone, we need to eat this before dark."
Old Zhou's voice was hoarse, with a heavy local accent, as he held up a black lump.
"This is called 'grey garlic,' made using local traditional methods."
"Eating it will mask our living presence, making it harder for those underground creatures to smell us. Otherwise, this place will get quite lively after dark."
As he spoke, he broke off a small piece, put it in his mouth, chewed it a few times without even frowning, clearly already used to it.
The group looked at each other, hesitant as they stared at the poorly presented "gray garlic."
He Yu was the first to take a piece; she was willing to try anything to find Zhang Xiaohou as soon as possible.
She took a small bite, and her face instantly lit up with excitement. She barely managed to hold it in and not spit it out.
Mo Fan also took a piece, and like Lao Zhou, broke off a piece and threw it into his mouth. The next second, his whole face was contorted.
"Holy crap! What is this taste?! It's bitter, astringent, and has a weird smell of moldy mud and sulfur! It's worse than the worst-tasting herbs!"
Mo Fan almost vomited, and it took several mouthfuls of water to calm him down. His tongue felt numb.
Others tried it one after another, and the reactions were similar, with various painful retching and cursing sounds rising and falling.
"Pah! Pah! Pah! Is this something a human could eat?"
"Guide, are you sure this will work? You're not just messing with us, are you?"
"My God, this taste is pure torture for my taste buds!"
Fu Ye also received a piece. He calmly accepted it, already mentally prepared for the smell of grey garlic, having heard about it briefly from the original novel in his previous life.
But when he actually put a small piece in his mouth, his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly.
Fu Ye thought to himself: It truly lives up to its reputation. This taste, a mixture of extreme bitterness, astringency, earthiness, decay, and an indescribable pungent odor, is a complete assault on the senses. No wonder even Mo Fan, a transmigrator, couldn't stand it.
But he chewed without pausing, swallowing the small piece of gray garlic without changing his expression, as if he had only eaten a piece of tasteless dry food.
This unusual composure caused a flicker of surprise in Old Zhou's eyes as he secretly observed him.
As vampires, Liu Ru and Liu Xian naturally possess a cold and sinister aura, giving them a natural advantage in concealing the presence of living people.
Fu Ye gestured to them that they didn't need to eat, and the two women obediently nodded and stood quietly behind him.
Just then, Fu Ye keenly sensed a probing gaze falling upon him.
He knew without turning around that it was Asha's Riya, the rather flamboyant information broker in the original story.
Soon, everyone had barely managed to swallow the garlic or at least keep it in their mouths.
A faint, strange smell, a mixture of earth and decay, emanated from everyone, indeed somewhat resembling the deathly aura surrounding them, effectively masking the vitality of the living.
Almost as soon as everyone had adapted to, or rather, endured, this strange feeling, the last rays of the sun disappeared completely below the horizon.
"Roar."
A low, hoarse, chilling wailing sound began to come from all directions, initially faint, but quickly becoming dense and clear. "Shh-shh-crack"
The fine sand beneath their feet began to wriggle and bulge!
One after another, pale, rotting arms, reduced to mere bones, burst forth from the earth!
Next came heads, torsos, and countless skulls and rotting corpses, swaying as they crawled out of the ground, their eye sockets or decaying eye sockets flickering with eerie green flames of their souls.
They wandered aimlessly, uttering meaningless roars, and the saltwater area instantly turned into a sea of the dead.
The sheer number far exceeded everyone's expectations.
Although these lowest-level undead are slow-moving and have limited attack power, their sheer number means that once they get entangled, the consequences would be unimaginable.
"Don't make a sound! Don't move! Contain your magic! Follow me, walk slowly!"
Old Zhou lowered his voice and gave the urgent order, his tone filled with unquestionable tension.
The group immediately fell into a deathly silence, even their breathing became extremely quiet.
The group followed behind Old Zhou, carefully making their way through the dense crowd of undead.
The scent of the grey garlic seemed to have worked. The undead ignored the living people nearby and continued to wander aimlessly. Occasionally, when an undead bumped into someone, they would simply sluggishly walk around it.
This scene was extremely bizarre.
A group of living people walked like ghosts among the undead, surrounded by countless hideous monsters, and the air was filled with the stench of death and decay.
The immense psychological pressure made everyone tense. He Yu covered her mouth tightly, her face pale.
Mo Fan's hand remained pressed against the spot where he could unleash magic at any moment.
The other team members were also sweating profusely, feeling as if they were walking on thin ice.
Fu Ye remained the calmest of them all.
Liu Ru and Liu Xian showed no fear whatsoever. Vampires and undead are actually family, to be precise. Seeing them actually gave the environment a kind of "friendly" yet chilling feeling.
Asha'ruya moved with light steps, as if strolling in her own backyard, her purple eyes curiously observing the undead around her, occasionally glancing at certain skeletons with unusual shapes.
Not long after.
Under the protection of Hui Suan and led by Lao Zhou, the team made a difficult journey toward Yangyang Village.
However, when the team finally arrived at Yangyang Village, which was marked on the map, the scene before them made everyone's hearts sink to the bottom.
There were no villages, no houses, no smoke from cooking fires, and not even ruins.
There was only a vast expanse of churned black soil.
The soil was covered with holes of all sizes, like the traces left by some giant creature that had burrowed into the ground.
The entire Yangyang Village, along with any trace of it, was erased.
"Is this Yangyang Village?"
He Yu's voice trembled, choked with sobs; she couldn't accept this fact.
Xiao Hou's final resting place is here, but what about the village? What about the people?
Mo Fan's face was ashen. He squatted down, grabbed a handful of black soil, and carefully examined it, his brows furrowed.
Old Zhou was also dumbfounded, muttering to himself.
"That's not right. I brought people here last month. The village may be dilapidated, but it's still here. How could this be?"
The others in the group exchanged bewildered glances, their eyes filled with surprise and unease. (End of Chapter)